Of Bernie, the Hall, and that certain other third baseman.

 

You know who's NOT in baseball's Hall of Fame?

Abner Doubleday, that's who's not. Even though the Hall is in Cooperstown because, one glimmering day in 1839, young Abner supposedly laid out the rules and dimensions of our national pastime along the shores of the Glimmerglass.

Tommy rot, as it turned out. Doubleday was quite a character, sort of the Forrest Gump of the 19th century, a soldier, mystic, and bibliophile with an uncanny knack for being around when anything of significance was going on.

He read Sanskrit, corresponded with Ralph Waldo Emerson, attended White House seances with Mary Todd Lincoln, was at Fort Sumter when the first shot of the Civil War was fired, held the line at Gettysburg—and took the train back there with Lincoln, when he gave the Gettysburg Address. 

But he did NOT invent the game of baseball. 

One of Doubleday's best friends, one A.G. Mills, the man who arranged his funeral and got him buried at Arlington, admitted that he never heard Abner so much as mention baseball. Why was this significant? Because Mills was the president of the National League for about 20 years.

In a brief autobiographical sketch, Doubleday himself wrote that, "In my outdoor sports, I was addicted to—"—wait for it!—"topographical work." 

Not even the HOF could convince itself to admit Topographical Work Doubleday, despite his being the entire excuse for its location in a charming, upstate town. 

Pretty much everything else everyone has said here about the Hall is also true—and more! The HOF is indeed controlled by the evil Clark family, a bunch of exasperating, right-wing zealots whose own main addiction is...polo. And the standards for just who should be in the Hall and why have been wildly inconsistent over the years, which...is just fine, as I see it.

Hell, it keeps the hot stove arguments coming. When was the last time you heard a passionate discussion over who should or should not be in the NFL's Hall of Fame, in Canton, Ohio?

Sure, the sportswriters who first select the Famers have generally made a hash of it. Even worse has been the follow-up, Veterans Committee, which should really be renamed The Old Cronies and Drinking Buddies Committee, and which is responsible for the likes of Rabbit Maranville, holder of the all-time record for choking up, being in Cooperstown.

It may be true, as the late Sen. Moynihan claimed, that everyone is NOT entitled to their own facts. But everyone sure as hell has their own concept of the Hall of Fame.

Some want it to be JUST the immortals. Ruth, Wagner, Mays, Aaron, Mantle, etc. Nothing below the really, truly special. 

Others have seriously proposed a multi-ringed Hall of Fame, with the all-time greats in some very special Valhalla, and the lesser greats in lower rings. But this seems more than a little mean-spirited—and would no doubt open new disputes.

Some even want to remove the unworthy selections from the Hall. But this seems unbelievably cruel to those who were chosen and their friends and families—such as the aforementioned Rabbit Maranville, seen below at the age of 39.

 (No, he really is 39 here, you can tell by that whacko arm patch honoring some sort of Pilgrim anniversary. Grizzle much?)

Anyhoo, no matter what system you adopt, the Hall always has and always will start to bleed around the edges. 

"Are you saying Dopey Dildox is no Fibber McGee? Why, don't you know that statistics are/are not the whole story?"

Which, again, is fine by me. 

But the way selections to the Hall have generally evolved, you get in if you were, indeed, an immortal, or if you were pretty damned good, for a very long time. Which I also have to admit has its merits. Hence the selections this year of Scott Rolen and Fred McGriff.

Much has been written here about whothehellis Scott Rolen, and how if HE'S in the Hall, then why not Graig "Puff" Nettles? 

Well, I love me some Graig Nettles. To death. Both he and Rolen were power hitters with magic gloves at third base, both of whom played for a very long time (Nettles, 22 years in the bigs, Rolen, 17). And in the course of those long careers, Rolen compiled an OPS that was over 100 points HIGHER than our Graig's, .855-.750, and won 8 Gold Gloves to Nettles' 2. 

In short, a typical Nettles season over his whole career, projected out to 162 games, was 20 doubles, 2 triples, 23 homers, 79 RBI, and a .248 BA. The same for Rolen was 41 doubles, 3 triples, 25 home runs, 102 RBI, and .281.

So there we are. Rolen was indeed a model of consistency—outstanding consistency, year after year. So was McGriff, who we lost in perhaps the worst single trade in Yankees history. 

Did you know, for instance, that McGriff's career OPS was 56 points higher than Don Mattingly's, .886 to .830? I didn't, until I looked it up.

Donnie Baseball is one of those guys on the HOF cusp. Six seasons that were Grade-A, Cooperstown-quality great...and another 5-6 that were perfectly respectable, along with 9 Gold Gloves at a position not considered that important.

Then there's Roger Maris, for whose induction there has been quite a clamor of late. But the Rajah had two great seasons and 3-4 good ones, before his career was foreshortened by injury. By almost all HOF standards over the years, that doesn't cut it.

The real specter haunting Cooperstown these days? The fact that—just like the rest of baseball—it still has yet to come to terms with juicing.

In fact, the compromise the Hall and its voters have stumbled into seems about as stupid as possible. Admitted juicer Mike Piazza gets in—after enduring a "penalty" of four years of delays. Admitted juicer Big Papi is in, apparently on the personality vote, while the likes of Manny Ramirez and Albert Belle—even more deserving, when it comes to the stats—will probably never get in.

And then, of course, there's the likes of Barry Bonds, and Roger Clemens, and that other, certain third baseman, the man, the myth, the human satyr known as A-Rod.

Sigh.

What is there to do about a problem like Rodriguez?

I dunno, but SOME standard would be appreciated, lest the Hall become simply, Players We Like the Bestest.

What the failure to deal—still!—with steroids does is occlude the candidacies of other, deserving players.

Years ago, Bernabe Williams, another just-miss Haller, made the provocative argument that players like he—who went pretty much their whole careers playing AGAINST juicers, without juicing themselves—should make the Hall.

After all, without having to take on all those cheaters, their stats would be both relatively and absolutely better. Right?

It's a difficult argument to refute. And it makes me think of the one former Yankee who has really been done dirt by MLB's refusal to think straight about steroids.

That man is Jor-ge Posada, who for about ten years was widely acknowledged to be the second-best catcher in the American League. 

The man widely acknowledged to be the best? Widely acknowledged juicer—and Hall of Famer—Ivan Rodriguez. 

Jorge has never been so much as accused as juicing himself. And even so, his career OPS was FIFTY points higher than I-Rod's, .848-.798. (Amazing, when you consider the wind resistance that Posada's ears alone must have created running down to first base.)

So sing me no Rogers, no Graigs or Donnies. The man we need to get in the Hall is Jorge Posada!

(Of course, he was no Rabbit Maranville.)